Hike for Light - Mt. Kanlaon

We had very little time to rest our weary legs after returning from the first hike.  We arrived in Manila on Monday evening, and were on a plane to Bacolod the following Friday.  This hike was Mt. Kanlaon, the tallest mountain in the Visayas region of the Philippines.  Kanlaon is an active volcano, and is known to have a large leech population along the trail.  Needless to say, we were pretty excited.

Our group for this climb was about half the size, and only 14 of us were allowed to climb.  However, our group this time included a couple different team Everest climbers, 4 Climbers from Negros Youth for the Environment, as well as the Menor brothers.  For those of you wondering who the Menor brothers are, where have you been?  Kidding, Ronel and Marlon Menor are two employees of Hybrid Social Solutions.  Marlon has been with the company longer than anyone except Jim himself, and is our highest grossing area sales manager.  Ronel is our technician, in charge of field testing and repairing all of our solar units.  Both gentlemen are super smart, athletic, humble, and annoyingly good at chess.  I consider myself to be a pretty good chess player, but have only managed to beat Ronel 3 times out of maybe 100 games.  I’ve never beaten Marlon.  Apparently both of them played for their high school in their local province and competed at the national level.  It’s to the point where I will think I’m winning, then make a move I think is pretty darn good, and Ronel says, “are you sure?”  And I’m like, ugh, no, I’m not sure, but that’s the move.  And he says, “ok, mate in 3, Danny.” 

We brought a chessboard on the hike, and the three of us played whenever we had spare time - the airport, the airplane, in our tent until late into the night up on the mountain.

We arrived in Bacolod, on the Island of Negros, and proceeded to our sleeping accommodation at the foot of the mountain.  In general our lodgings were much nicer on this climb.  We slept the first night in a dorm type room at a local hotel about a 5 minute drive from the trailhead.  There was running water, electricity, the works.  Our Hike organizer, Bambi, did the first turnover ceremony by herself the next day while we were hiking.  We were sorry to miss it, but had a second lantern turnover scheduled for the coming Monday.

This hike was a bit easier.  I think a lot of this had to do with us being in better shape, but it was also less steep, less muddy, and a shorter distance.  However, the first half of the hike is leech territory.  We had heard slightly exaggerated stories from the Everest climbers that had been on the mountain before, and it was a constant source of worry and group jokes leading up to the hike.  I did a fair amount of internet research, and sent tips to the group (The best advice I found is posted below). 

“Leeches are common in rainforests of Madagascar, mainland Africa, and Southeast Asia. Unlike leeches in other parts of the world, rainforest leeches live in leaf litter and vegetation -- they are not aquatic. They find their prey (you and other warm-blooded animals) by odor and sound vibrations. In leech-rich areas, if you stand still for a few minutes, you'll see leeches dropping from vegetation and moving toward you like inchworms.

Terrestrial leeches are generally small (although they can get quite huge in some parts of the world) but will gorge themselves during a meal, gaining up to ten times their weight. The single feeding will be enough to sustain a leech for several months.

The best protection against leeches is covering up and using insect repellent on clothing, although they are extremely persistent and invariably if you spend enough tromping around in the forest you will get leeched. Do not get overly concerned about a leech attack -- they carry no disease and there is low risk of causing significant blood loss. Leech bites do not hurt -- since they release an anesthetic when they sink their teeth into your skin -- but they do bleed profusely. Leeches use an anticoagulant when they bite to facilitate the flow of blood from the wound. “

Removing a leech

If you are bitten by a leech and are compelled to remove it before it has had its full (leeches drop off on their own when they are done feeding), you can do so by following these steps:

Identify the anterior (oral) sucker which will be found at the small end of the leech. Put your finger on your skin adjacent to the oral sucker Gently but firmly slide your finger toward the wound where the leech is feeding. Using your fingernail, push the sucker sideways away from your skin. Once you have dislodged the oral sucker, quickly detach the posterior (rear) sucker (the fat end of the leech). Try flicking the leech or proding with your fingernail. As you work to remove the leech, it will attempt to reattach itself. Keep the wound clean -- minor cuts in tropical climates can quickly become infected. The leech itself is not poisonous. The wound will itch as it heals.

NOTE: Is it generally not advised to attempt removing a leech by burning with a cigarette; applying alcohol, mosquito repellent, shampoo, or salt; or pulling at the leech. This can result the leech regurgitating into the wound and causing infection much worse than the leech bite itself" 

I personally set off for the hike with my pants tucked into my socks with REI bought insect repellent smeared around all openings in my clothing.  However, about 2 hours up the trail there was a waterfall with a deeper pool beneath it, and I just had to go swimming, leeches be damned. 

After all the fretting, the leeches turned out to not be that big of a problem.  Our guides told us we were lucky because it had been relatively dry lately, which meant fewer leeches.  However, we did see about 10 of them, and they are pretty creepy.  The creepiest thing is that you never feel them.  You just look down and this thing is on your hand or your pants wriggling around looking for a place to attach.  We sat down for a snack at one point, and a leech just fell onto my hand.  Like, literally dive-bombed me out of the foliage above.  

In general the hike was quite pleasant, beautiful weather, and we reached the campsite by around 2:00pm.  We set up camp and decided to head up to the summit  before dinner.  The hike to the summit is about 45 minutes from the campsite.  The campsite is right at the end of the tree line, and the surroundings are lush and green.  However, the scenery changes drastically on the hike up to the summit. The hike is mostly a scramble over loose volcano rocks, and you quickly climb past where anything can grow.  The summit provides an amazingly picturesque view.  It is possible to walk right up to the edge of the crater and look over the edge.  In one direction lies the crater with another tall peak on the other side, and in the opposite direction is the way back down, with lush green mountains in the distance.  We were above most of the clouds, and visibility changes rapidly.  One minute we could see for miles, and the next minute it’s difficult to see anything over 20 feet away.  The crater has an amazing echo, and we spent a while whooping, whistling, and throwing rocks over the edge. 

After about an hour of photo taking, we hiked back down to camp.  There was a moment on the hike down when the clouds parted, the sun came out, and there was a gorgeous view of the mountains below.  I could see our campsite, right on the edge of the tree line, and the old crater below it.  I sat and gazed for a few minutes, until the clouds moved back in and the view was gone.  

That night, we feasted on Chicken Adobo (Thanks Paulo!) and had another round of rum combined with telling the group about our thoughts on the hike for light and favorite moments so far. 

We got up the next day at 4:00 am, boiled some water for coffee in the dark, and headed back up to the summit in time to catch the sunrise.  It was absolutely beautiful, hard to describe, but fortunately I don’t have to.  We brought a professional photographer, Fung, along with us this time, and his specialty is 360 degree interactive photos.  Check out the link below.  If you zoom in really far you can see me sitting on the edge of the crater.  Hope Fung is able to join us on future hikes, this really is the only way to do this scene justice.

http://www.virtualphilippines.net/Panoramas/H4L/Kanlaon/Kanlaon_Crater.html

http://www.virtualphilippines.net/Panoramas/H4L/Kanlaon/Summit_Group.html

 

After hiking down, cooking breakfast, and breaking camp, we headed back down.  On the way back down, we dropped our bags off at one point, and hiked down into the old crater, a bright green valley surrounded by mountains on all sides.  It was quite a steep hike, roughly an extra hour of climbing, but totally worth it.  The crater is now flat, and covered with a grass-like fern.  It would have been a sweet place to camp, but the hike down with packs on would have been a little rough.

Once back on the trail we hiked down very quickly.  We were all excited to get back, and were blessed with Ronel’s singing top 40 hits from the last 15 years to give us encouragement.  With only a couple short stops, we were back at the base in about 3 hours.  We got there just when it started to rain for the first time, bought snacks from the local sari sari store, and played a few games of chess.  

When the rest of the group got back, we ate lunch, then bussed to the Mambukal Spring Resort which had…hot springs!  The whole place reeked of sulfur, and the pools were really hot, even by lobster standards.  We all soaked in the hot spring for about an hour, gazing up at the huge bats (flying foxes?) soaring overhead.  That night we had cheeseburgers and red horse (strong local beer) for dinner, the perfect meal for tired hikers.

First thing the next morning we headed to the second turnover ceremony in Guintubdan.  About 40 residents from a village quite a ways away, had been provided with transportation to Guintubdan to meet us for the turnover.  Jim flew down to meet us for the ceremony, and spoke to the group about the purpose of our organization and the benefits we had scene the lanterns have in nearby communities.  Representatives from local NGOs including the Negros Women for Tomorrow Foundation and the Alliance for Development spoke, and Ronel gave a demonstration of how to set up the lantern, use the solar panel and charge a cell phone.

http://www.virtualphilippines.net/Panoramas/H4L/Kanlaon/Turnover_Group.html

The trip back went very smoothly, this time on a flight donated by Zest Airlines. 

Stay tuned for Mt. Majaas, Dec 15-18, just before I leave for Christmas in Seattle!!

Hike for Light - Mt. Kitanglad

The first Hike for light, Mt. Apo, was scheduled for November 18^th-21^st.  However, I received the following text on Nov. 16^th:

“Hi Danny, Please be informed that Mt. Apo Climb has been indefinitely postponed, as per recommendation of the LGUs and the 39^th Infantry Brigade. There have been heavy armed group movements and encounters within Mt. Apo lately.  We will confer again next week about the situation and we will see when we can reschedule the hike.  Sorry for the inconvenience this might have caused you.  We hope you understand your safety is important to us.”

This was quite a bummer, as we had all been pretty psyched for this first hike.  However, the second hike was scheduled for the following weekend.

The Mt. Kitanglad climb began at the international airport in Manila at 5am Friday morning.  The Manila Crew, consisting of 3 Solar Energy Foundation representatives, 2 Team Everest volunteers, and 2 significant others, boarded our flight (donated by Cebu Pacific Airlines) bound for Cagayan de Oro, Mindanao.  From Cagayan de Oro we traveled by van to the city of Malaybalay, kicking off the hike with lunch and a press conference prepared by the Office of Mayor Hon Inaki Zubiri.  Here we also met the rest of Team Everest, as well as the local climbers that would accompany us up the mountain.  We were 32 in all, a combination of awesome individuals from local climbing groups, nature NGOs, and Everest expeditions.  After lunch we piled our gear into a Jeepney and headed for the base of Mt. Dulang Dulang, the highest peak in the Mt. Kitanglad Range. 

Here is our evening itinerary:

1500 Lamp Use & Management Orientation – Turnover Ceremony

1700 Dinner - Prepare for Next day’s climb

1900 Ritual Sacrifice by the Talaandig tribe

2100 Lights out

The ritual sacrifice was performed by three elders from the village.  A white cloth was laid out on the table, and each hiker placed a 1 peso coin around the outside edge of the cloth, heads up.  Four bottles of “Fighter” brand wine were also placed on the table, along with a 1000 peso bill and a dozen eggs. After a prayer spoken by the most elder member of the tribe, they brought out three chickens, held them over a bucket, slit their throats one by one, and drained the blood into the bucket.  After being slaughtered, the chickens were tossed onto the ground, flapped around a couple times, then lay still. Once dead, the chickens were loaded into a pot and boiled for about an hour. 

While the chickens were boiling, we passed the lanterns to the tribal elders.  During the turnover ceremony, we showed them how to use the different settings, recharge the lantern, and charge a cell phone.  The most important part of this is to teach them the importance of charging the lantern every day.  Our lanterns use a deep cycle gel battery, which really isn’t designed to run all the way down to empty.  If that happens, they take much longer to recharge.  The advice we give them is to not let the battery drain down below 3 bars out of 5, which is sustainable if they monitor their usage and charge it every day.

The elders then served the three chickens to us, informing each hiker to pull off and eat a piece of meat.  Afterwards, they cut the white cloth into small pieces and tied one coin into each piece of cloth.  The next day we would carry these up the mountain for safety.

Dinner that night, as was the case for all meals on the Hike for light, consisted of canned tuna donated by Century Tuna.  Over the next 3 days we would get quite creative with our tuna combinations.  You know what goes great with rice?  Canned Tuna.  You know what goes great with bread and eggs?  Canned tuna.  You know what makes coffee taste great?  Drinking out of a cup recently filled with Canned Tuna.

We awoke at 4:30 the next morning and broke camp shortly after sunrise. We began along a slippery, rocky, dirt road, winding up the side of the mountain between assorted crops and farmhouses.  This soon turned into a thin, steep, muddy path through the forest that continued until the summit.  The scenery was spectacular, lush green mountains as far as the eye could see, and up close the deep greens of grasses, ferns and tree leaves. Thick moss grew along every tree, and the much of the forest looked like a scene out of Avatar.  The ground was so soft in places it would depress noticeably with each step. 

The hike to our campsite took about 8 hours.  We stopped for lunch next to a river making its way down the mountainside, and enjoyed some cans of Tuna and a couple granola bars.  You know what goes great with granola bars?  You guessed it.  I was a bit hesitant about drinking water from the river, as I remember my GHS Post 84 training about Giardia, etc present in natural water sources.  However, I didn’t really have much choice, as this was the only source of water throughout the hike. 

At our lunch spot was the first time I noticed that we had porters carrying a bunch of gear up to our campsite.  These were guys from the local village, payed roughly 12 dollars a day, carrying extra tents, sleeping bags and food up the mountain.  These guys were incredible, each one was about half my size, and carried a pack 3-4 times the size of my own.  One of them was wearing flip flops, and one was about 50 years old and BAREFOOT.  These guys were true champions, running up and down the mountain barely breaking a sweat.

Our campsite was about an hour hike from the summit, and we arrived by 4 in the afternoon.  This left us enough time to set up camp and cook dinner before nightfall.  Once it got dark (around 7:30), we all gathered in a circle around the light of our solar lantern.  Fred, a 60 year old gentlemen from team Everest, pulled out a little red and white cup which he had carried all the way up Everest many years ago.  He proceeded to pour himself a shot of Tanduay rum, and tell us a bit about himself and why he was there.  He then proclaimed that we would go around in a circle and all give a short introduction of ourselves and our involvement in the Hike for light.  And in the words of Fred, “if you don’t drink, you can’t talk!”  This initiated a raucous role call as each person was peer pressured into taking shots and giving a speech for the whole group.  After each person in their 20’s finished speaking, Fred (who was a bit tipsy by this point) would inquire – “Single? Are you single??”

It got cold that night, and I related during my speech that this was the first time I had felt cold since arriving in the Philippines 4 months ago.  It also rained throughout the night, and I ended up using all of the cold weather gear I had brought.  We headed for the summit at 4:30 in the pitch dark.  This trail was even steeper, and quite slippery under the wet conditions.  Much of it required scrambling using both hands to maintain balance.  We all reached the summit by 5:30, and took pictures for about an hour.  Unfortunately it was quite foggy and cloudy, and there wasn’t much of a view.  However, there was a grove of giant bonsai trees where we all hung our coins from the ritual on the first night. 

The hike down went surprisingly quickly, less than half the time to hike up.  Upon arriving back at the village we all changed out of our wet, muddy hiking gear, and showered (Bucket shower with frigid water), and put on the relatively clean clothes we had left.  The plan was to travel by Jeepney to another village for the final lantern turnover ceremony, but shortly after changing we were informed that there would actually be another hike to get to the next village.  Initially, the next village was supposed to be an hour jeepney ride, and a half hour hike.  We waited at camp from about 3pm-5pm for stragglers to arrive back from the hike.  However, as it began to get later and later we decided it would be best to go on ahead and provide for other transportation for the last of the hikers.

The hour Jeepney ride turned out to be quite a bit longer than we initially planned.  The Jeep broke down at one point, we ran into heavy traffic, and stopped for gas.  Additionally, it started pouring rain, so much so that the Jeepney driver informed us that he would not be able to deliver us to the trailhead.  This meant an additional 3 hour hike to reach our destination, which certainly wasn’t going to happen.  After stopping again to haggle and discuss, we managed to coerce the driver to at least make an attempt to drive down the dirt road and deliver us to the trailhead.  Fortunately he was able to get us most of the way there, and we disembarked around 8pm. 

From here we all put our packs back on, and headed off into the darkness with our headlamps.  Immediately after starting the hike it resumed pouring rain, and boy did we get a small taste of what life is like without electricity.  The trail was quite muddy and steep in places, and we were hiking in pitch darkness, led only by a couple of locals with the pretense that we would eventually arrive at a village.  There were two river crossings, requiring us to jump from boulder to boulder to reach the other side.  I attempted to keep up with Janet, one of the members of the first all women team to ever traverse Mt. Everest, and we soon became separated from the rest of the group.  This left 3 of us - me, Janet, and one of the guides, hiking with just my headlamp.  Around 9pm, we finally we saw a solar light in the distance, and soon arrived at the village. 

We were all soaking wet and pretty worn out, but could not have received a warmer welcome.  Several families from the village were still up, and had hot chocolate and a whole table full of food waiting for us, none of which contained Tuna.  We observed another chicken sacrifice ritual, turned over the solar lanterns, and feasted to our heart’s content. 

At this village we also met an old woman that weaves straw bags to sell at the local market.  We learned that she is unable to weave during most days, since the heat makes the straw brittle.  Therefore, she only weaves at night, but has limited light options.  She can run their generator (very expensive), use a kerosene lamp (dirty, smelly, dangerous), or use a solar lantern!  An older gentlemen, upon first seeing the solar lantern, immediately proclaimed in Visayas dialect that it would be an excellent tool for hunting frogs.  It’s wonderful to hear these stories, and to find additional applications of our lanterns that never crossed our minds.

After dinner we all slept on the floor of their activity center, slumber party style.  The following morning we again awoke early, and began hiking out before sunrise.  The hike out, along the same trail that had been so miserable the night before, turned out to be gorgeous.  The skies had cleared, and as the sun rose we lazily hiked out through open meadows full of flowers and dotted with fruit trees, with the peaks of the Mt. Kitanglad range in the background.

The ST2

Realized I haven't actually shared any info about the products we are selling. The Hike for Light is a campaign highlighting our solar lanterns, the premier model of which is the ST2. ST stands for Sun Transfer, a German owned partner company that manufactures the lanterns.

These lanterns retail in off-grid communities for Php 3,500, roughly $80. This is a big expense for our customers, and is almost always accompanied by a micro-loan, typically repaid over 6 months. The cost savings to pay for this loan come from:

1. Eliminated cost of buying kerosene for lighting

2. Eliminated cost of charging cell phone - even families without electricity here have cell phones, and often have to travel great distances and pay to charge them. Owning an ST2 eliminates the charging cost and allows for more productive use of time.

3. Increased income - We have compiled many user stories that show increased income associated with owning a solar lantern. One lady owned a small convenience store, known locally as a Sari Sari store, and saw her income increase substantially from being the only store in the village with a light on in the evening. Another lady was able to guard her fruit trees from bats more effectively with a constant source of bright light at night, and benefited from a much richer harvest.

While these costs savings often cover the loan repayment on a daily basis, most families see this as an investment. One lady related that she would often tell her children to stop studying at night when she went to bed, fearing that they would accidentally knock over the kerosene lantern and set the house on fire. Her children were also not fond of studying in the dim, smokey light. 6 months after receiving a solar lantern, all of her kids had become honor students. The benefit for this woman was elimination of the constant worry that her children would accidentally fall asleep and burn their house down. It's difficult to quantify that in an excel sheet.

Specs for these lanterns included below, taken from the Suntransfer website. For more info you can check out www.suntransfer.com

Light

• 3 settings for light: low / medium / high
• Hours of light with full battery:
  - low: at least 150 hours
  - medium: at least 15 hours
  - high: at least 6 hours
• Remote power on/off switch (cable 3m)

Mobile charger

• USB cable with 8 adapters for the most common mobile phones

Technology

• High-power LED: 90-100 lumen/W
• Module: 2 Wp crystalline silicon solar module with aluminium frame and tempered glass
  Optional power extension up to 4Wp
• Battery: durable, long life GEL-battery 6V / 4.5 Ah
• Water and dust resistant, standard IP 65

Size

• Lamp: 125.6 x 106.5 x 137.4 mm
• Module: 140 x 165 x 15 mm

Options

• Power extention: additional 2 Wp solar module plus wire
• Grid connector

Hike for Light

Over the next few months, Hybrid Social Solutions, along with Stiftung Solarenergie Philippines (StS PH) will be participating in the Hike for Light.

This event is the second in a series of nationwide campaigns to distribute solar-powered energy systems to Filipino communities in the mountains. This campaign follows the Ride for Light, a 19 day motorcycle journey which brought almost 600 solar home systems to 80 communities across the Philippine archipelago in April and May 2011.

The climbs will consist of the six highest mountains in the Philippines, and climbers will supply 500 lights for 500 off grid families along the way. The climbs will be led by Kaya ng Pinoy’s Team Everest, the first Philippine Mount Everest expedition in history.

Provision of lanterns will be combined with training to ensure that beneficiaries know how to maximize the use of our products and receive proper technical support after we have left. In addition, this allows local residents and partners to see the value of these lanterns first hand. While the initial campaign is a donation, these campaigns are designed to produce future sales channels.

Having access to a reliable source of light is crucial for families living in the mountains. From being able to see the dangerous terrain to monitoring livestock at night, access to a clean, reliable source of light will be a great asset for these communities.

I am hoping to attend all of them, although I am told that the last one may be off limits. It is the most difficult of the climbs, and involves some actual rock climbing.

Barangay Encanto

Gawad Kalinga, meaning “to give care,” is the name of the largest Filipino Non-profit agency. Founded by last year’s Filipino social entrepreneur of the year, Tony Meloto, this organization started out building houses in communities under extreme poverty, and now does much more. Barangay Encanto (Enchanted Village), located just a couple hours outside of Manila, is their model site. What they have done here is pretty extraordinary. This village was once occupied primarily by anti-government rebels, and displaced squatters from Manila. Gawad Kalinga (GK) began building houses in this location about 8 years ago, and once those were constructed went to work helping local residents use their knowledge and skills to start micro-enterprises. As Tony describes it, the first step is restoring dignity, then comes empowerment. There are about 6 businesses currently operating out of this village. They are selling bamboo furniture and bikes, health and beauty products, duck eggs, goat cheese, handwoven bags, and bottled iced tea. These products use all natural, locally grown raw materials, and are made by local residents. Each business is owned by local entrepreneurs. The village has a fully functioning restaurant, and they are currently building a bed and breakfast in order to attract tourists.

Hybrid Social Solutions, the company I am working for, has been active in this village for some time providing solar lanterns. While they have electricity in some parts of the village, many houses do not. In addition, they often lose power for various reasons. Our most recent project is a solar computer lab. I spent some time with our technician going around to electronics manufacturers searching for the computer monitor that uses the fewest watts per hour. The money for the construction of this computer lab was donated, but the vision is that there will be a small hourly charge to use the machines. Like everything else in this village, it is a strange mix of charity (capital cost is donated) and enterprise (revenue covers operating expenses). We also installed a solar home yesterday (donated), including two lanterns, a TV, and a Dvd player. For those of you questioning the wisdom of donating a Dvd player to a family living in extreme poverty, I’m with you.

Finally, we recently installed a Starfish water purification system in their kitchen area. Starfish water purification technology is manufactured by Starfish Hong Kong, and Hybrid Social solutions is the exclusive distributor in the Philippines. Prices and participation may vary.

This technology is now operational, pending bacteriological testing (fingers crossed), and will be the next GK enterprise. They will be bottling and selling Enchanted Spring purified mineral water. This water will be sold to local residents, many of whom use captured rain water for bathing and washing dishes. Some use this water for drinking, but many buy bottled water (5g jugs) from outside the village, particularly for their children. The restaurant also buys water from outside the village, and consumes a substantial amount. The owners of the water business will fill 5g Jugs and sell them to local residents as well as the restaurant. This brings revenue to the owners and staff working at the filling station, and also provides low-cost water to village residents (jugs will be sold for 20 pesos, rather than the 35 that residents currently pay. 20 pesos is roughly $.50).

In addition, Enchanted Spring water will be sold at a higher markup in the nearby town. Profit sharing from the filling station will be shared among GK, the local entrepreneur managing the station, the employees filling bottles, and the community. The community dividend will be used to build a sanitation area behind the filling station, complete with toilets, showers, and laundry facilities.

I have had some difficulty coordinating the exchanges between Starfish and staff onsite at the village, so made sure to be onsite for the next meeting. I arrived on tuesday with my colleague Ronel, our solar technician, after riding the subway, a bus, a trike, and a jeepney. I spent the morning meeting with the three staff and making sure that everything was in order for a visit from Starfish technicians. This didn’t take much time, I just needed to ensure that the three main point people would be onsite Wednesday, and make sure that we had the door key to access the machine. Starfish would be arriving the following morning to train staff and take samples for testing.

At this point it was about 11am, and I spent a couple hours helping (more like watching) Ronel install solar devices in a local home and train the family in how to use the technology. After lunch, Ronel went back to Manila and I was put to work by Mira, a filipina with a masters in agriculture, who has decided to spend the year living and working in enchanted village. I spent the afternoon planting grass and learning about the different crops currently growing at the farm.

Once 6:00 rolled around, all of the men working in the village met up at...the basketball court! And by court, I mean hoop attached to a tree on the side of the road. Shots from the left side of the court were easily blocked by low hanging branches. But every young guy in the village must have been out there, and they were GOOD. I may or may not have gotten schooled by a guy wearing one flip flop. He wasn’t barefoot. He wasn’t wearing flip flops. He was wearing one flip flop. And...this cat could ball, man. In general all of them were very talented, amazing ability to cut in flip flops. A little after 7 it got pretty dark and games kind of died down. I made a joke about how we should put a solar lantern up in the tree, and then noticed a guy climbing the tree to turn on lights already installed. After dumping rain water out of one of the bulbs, we had two functioning lights and played night ball for about an hour. We mostly played 3v3, and they insisted that I stay on the court even when my team lost.

I arrived at the restaurant around 8, late for dinner, but Mira had made sure the kitchen didn’t close before I could eat. While we were eating dinner, Remy, the mom from the house where Ronel had installed the solar appliances came by with another volunteer. Apparently the solar Dvd player was not working, and they believed I could fix it. I was envisioning some type of technical battery malfunction which I would have no idea how to fix, but said I would try to help. The whole family was gathered around the TV, and the current Dvd wouldn’t play at all. After taking it out I could see that it was badly scratched. They had one other Dvd - Batman, the Dark Knight. This one started up the menu screen immediately, and I explained to them that the other Dvd was just too damaged. Ok, they said, looking back at the TV Screen, which button is play? I looked at them quizzically for what I hope was only a moment, and then came to the realization that the Dvd player only had the shapes that I recognize as play, stop, FF, etc. Ronel hadn’t covered this in the training, assuming that they knew what these buttons meant, but they had no idea! If you think about it, they aren’t really all that intuitive, and must just look like hieroglyphs if you haven’t seen them before. I hate to call you out Mom, especially since you are such a tech whiz these days, but explaining the function of each button totally reminded me of helping you in your early three-remote days.

That night I slept in a dorm underneath a white mosquito net, which made me feel like a princess. I expressed this feeling to my roommates, volunteers from the Philippine Airforce, who found it quite amusing.

Boracay Wedding = Win

Three days after returning from Cebu, I once again left Manila, this time to attend a wedding in the Philippines premier beach destination called Boracay. Ken and I were invited to this wedding while out in a bar with some friends of friends the week before. An American military guy was marrying a filipina, and for various reasons had none of his family attending the wedding. They made the mistake of off-hand inviting us, and probably didn’t consider the possibility that we might actually come. It went something like, “hey we have plane tickets for both of Ricky’s brothers that can’t make it, do you guys want to come?YES.” This was an opportunity we were not prepared to pass up. We looked into purchasing fake ID’s with the names of Ricky’s brothers, but decided the possible risk of being caught at the airport with a fake ID was not worth the $200 to buy our own tickets. I can remember sitting in my room thursday night with Ken discussing whether it was worth the money to attend a wedding of people we didn’t know. How silly that seems in hindsight. We bought tickets friday morning, and hopped a flight to the beach that evening.

Boracay is a very small island with no airport, you have to fly to a nearby island and take a boat to get there. It consists almost entirely of beachfront resorts and water sports.

I’m gonna have trouble doing this justice in a blog entry, but suffice to say this weekend was a win. We met up with the wedding party on friday night, all of which were 20 something and awesome. Went from beach bar to flamenco show/restaurant (the flamenco show turned out to be one 60 year old dude, but that was as hilarious as it was disappointing - at one point he was flamenco dancing to top forty hits.) After dinner we went to another bar that I don’t recall the name of, but I do know they had rum buckets (pint of rum mixed with coke) for $5. After that it was dancing at clubs along the beach and then bacon cheeseburgers at jammers around 5am.

Next day was the wedding, which uh, set the bar pretty high. This day was legendary. Roughly 60-70 people, great assortment of Barongs. First there was the church wedding. Then the ceremony on the beach. From this point on there was an open bar throughout. And by open bar I mean the bartender would occasionally just leave, allowing us to pour our own drinks. Following the ceremony was the reception with live band and hors d'oeuvres. And Fire Dancers. Then dinner at nearby resort, buffet style with entire cow roasting on a spit, jello shot cake, and make it yourself Halo Halo. Then speeches and games. Then a showing of the video filmed throughout the day of them saying vows, running along the beach at sunset, etc. Then the fireworks show off of a boat out in the water, blasting Katy Perry. Then a different live band doing American covers and dance party on the beach.

I think our presence was actually very much appreciated, given that every other guest was a friend of the bride. When the photographer asked for a “friends of the groom” picture, we made things significantly less awkward.


Notable events:

Obama Grill along the beach, with Sunset Bonanza all you can drink from 5-8pm for $8.

Wading from club to club at 3am because the tide came in.

Did I mention the fire dancers?

Mitch stands corrected

"I like an escalator, because an escalator can never break--it can only become stairs. You would never see an 'Escalator Temporarily Out Of Order' sign, just 'Escalator Temporarily Stairs.' Sorry for the convenience. We apologize that you can still get up there."

- Mitch Hedberg

Cebu

Had my first vacation this last weekend, 4 day weekend for the end of Ramadan. Even though 98% of the country is Catholic...I believe the reason for this is to appease the muslim population located in the Mindanao region. Hey, you don’t have to explain yourself to me, Philippines.

My roommate had a free ticket to Cebu with his mom and Aunt, so I decided to tag along. Cebu is an island in the Visayas region in the Philippines, and I convinced them to come with me to a town called Moalboal because it is supposed to have fantastic Diving. And it does. Wall dives, reef dives, spectacular diversity of coral and wildlife, including sea turtles, dolphins, and, most famously, the Lion fish, which is pretty badass. I went on 4 dives, two full mornings, for a total cost of $100. Which, interestingly enough, I still haven’t paid for. They told me I could pay for the dives altogether at the end with a credit card, so I spent all my cash on Tanduay rum (obvi). Then when it came time to pay, their line for the credit card machine was down and they told me there was no way to enter the number manually over the phone.

There was also no functioning ATM for miles, although during my search I did discover an Automatic Tubig Machine (Tubig is the Tagalog word for Water). Their proposed solution was for me to go to an HSBC branch in Manila with their account number and deposit money that way. Ahh the developing world. No paperwork, just trust that I will do the right thing.

Anyways, this town is awesome, totally in the middle of nowhere, dirt road with small resorts along the beach. I could wander out of my guest house in the morning, cross the road, and be at the dive shop. The second morning it was just me and the dive master, Dodo, living the dream.

“I’d like to dive with some sea turtles, Dodo, where should we go?”

“Oh, Tongo Point, its beautiful and many sea turtles live there.”

“Word.”

It was beautiful weather the entire weekend, and we managed to avoid the typhoon that passed by Manila over the past few days. Actually a good deal more powerful that the one that just hit the east coast of the US. And I bet none of you Americans even knew about it. How does that make you feel? Just kidding, I hope everyone on the east coast is alright.

On the 3rd day Jeff and I rented motobikes and drove about 8 kilometers to Kawassan falls. It wasn’t quite the serene waterfall I had been anticipating, as the area was packed with filipino tourists. But the falls really were beautiful, with turquoise blue water and numerous pools deep enough for swimming.